How to Establish the “First” Profile for a New Product

Clever profiling software will calculate a profile based on the size of your PCB or from dummy profiles already loaded on the Reflow oven. It is part of the prediction utility of your profiling software or pre-installed on your reflow oven. This software mines prior work, including your own profiles developed from other products or, in the case of profiles that come pre-installed on the oven, known profiling outcomes based on the oven’s characteristics. It looks at known sizes of PCBs and their respected weights (i.e. mass), and how they interact with a known process environment (i.e. your specific reflow oven). What is exciting about this software is that it can give you a pretty good starting point when you are profiling a board for the first time. It is not foolproof, but it is quite common to get a process, in spec, after a few profiling runs while keeping your profiled PCB intact and sellable! The alternative is to spend hundreds of hours profiling new boards, with starting points based on conjecture. In this case, many boards would be sacrificed in the process. With products like KIC Auto-FocusTM and AUTOsetTM, your time and your PCBs are saved, saving you money!